China’s fake Paris: the mystery of the ghost towns

FOR RATHER inexplicable reasons the Chinese have built enormous residential complexes and cities that remain uninhabited and sometimes incomplete. 

The above material was produced by VICE, an HBO documentary series founded by Shane Smith, a Canadian.

The show’s politics are difficult to pigeonhole. In some aspects Smith and his team reflect the confusing left-liberal politics of Bill Maher, who serves as Executive Producer. Many segments are however far superior to standard US television fare in terms of a reportorial approach which is not afraid of including people of radical and revolutionary persuasion.  These are permitted to tell their side of the story without malicious “contextualizing”.  That’s refreshing, to say the least.

For example, a recent episode on the Egyptian situation (Egypt On the Brink) presented members of the government party—the Muslim Brotherhood—along with youths struggling to topple them, including Black Bloc anarchists and anti capitalists. That notwithstanding, VICE has also done a number of episodes on Libya, for example, which tended to present the US-sponsored rebels as the white hats.

The information below, from Wikipedia, clarifies the topic somewhat. His criticism of “socialism” derived from his experience in Canada sounds a bit simplistic, shopworn and petty  (there’s no socialism in Canada, only a mild form of social democracy, as in Scandinavia, which looks like socialism to those soaked in the savage libertarian ways of American capitalism). The idea that socialism kills “creativity” inherently is unprovable and nonsensical. Our guess is that Smith is mostly at home in the anti-communist “left”, and that while the VICE footage does present anticapitalist voices, it also presents many who facilitate the propaganda work of warmongers and imperialists. The VICE series comprises compelling programs, but keep your antenna up.—Eds.

History of VICE

Founded by Suroosh Alvi, Shane Smith, and Gavin McInnes, the magazine was launched in 1994 as the Voice of Montreal with government funding, and the intention of the founders was to provide work and a community service.^[5] When the editors later sought to dissolve their commitments with the original publisher Alix Laurent, they bought him out and changed the name to Vice in 1996.

Apparently unhappy in Canada, and in search of more streetwear advertising income, the magazine’s personnel relocated to New York City, U.S. in 1999. Smith has stated: “I grew up being a socialist and I have problems with it because I grew up in Canada [and] I’ve spent a lot of time in Scandinavia, where I believe countries legislate out creativity. They cut off the tall trees. Everyone’s a C-minus. I came to America from Canada because Canada is stultifyingly boring and incredibly hypocritical. Thanks, Canada.”^[6] In 2008, the magazine was read by over 900,000 people across twenty-two countries.^[7]

SEE MORE AT VICE: http://www.vice.com/author/shane-smith